Sports

Northeastern Junior College volleyball splits at home invite

Plainswomen defeated Hesston and Williston State, fell to North Platte and Eastern Arizona

By Kyle Inman

Journal-Advocate sports writer

Posted:
09/17/2017 09:15:39 PM MDT

Noel Phillips rises up for a kill in the final match of the day with the Eastern Arizona Gila Monsters. (Kyle Inman / Sterling Journal-Advocate)

The Northeastern Junior College volleyball team won two of four games over the weekend at the 34th annual Pizza Hut Invitational in Sterling.

The Plainswomen started off Friday by dropping a tough five-set match to the North Platte Knights. The team lost the first game 25-23, won the second 25-22, lost the third 25-23, then won the fourth 25-16 before losing the final game 15-13.

Sara Antic led NJC with 18 kills against North Platte while Noel Phillips added 12 and Emily McCurley had nine. Coach Jessica Squier said that the team was prone to mental errors throughout the game.

"North Platte did a really good job with blocking and the girls got really frustrated thinking that the block was smaller," Squier said. "We thought that we should have been able to hit through the block when we should have been hitting around it."

Sara Antic watches the ball drop for a point after sneaking it by two Hesston defenders. (Kyle Inman / Sterling Journal-Advocate)

The Plainswomen responded with a clean sweep of the Williston State Tetons. NJC won the first game 25-10, second 25-1, and finished the match off by winning 25-18. Antic led the attack with 14 kills, McCurley had nine, Phillips six, while Ashlyn Martinez and Kacey Jaeger each contributed five. Sofija Pajevic racked up 35 assists throughout the game.

NJC followed up the win on Saturday with a 3-1 victory of the Hesston Larks — winning the first set 25-19, second 25-14, losing the third 25-22 before winning 27-25. Antic led the team in kills with 17 while Martinez had 13 and McCurley contributed nine.

The final match of the tournament saw the Plainswomen lose to the Eastern Arizona College Gila Monsters 3-1. The Monsters went 4-0 for the weekend.

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Squier was disappointed with the loss, but said that the team's errors were fixable. She plans to sharpen mental focus in practice during the upcoming week.

"The girls lost focus of what the controllables were," the coach said. "We just have to make sure we aren't making those mental errors and that we go into next week with goals in mind."

Antic led the Plainswomen in kills during all four games of the tournament. The freshman from Serbia has proven to be a scoring weapon for the Plainswomen so far this season.

"She played well offensively for us," Squier said. "She's got a great serve, which enables us to get a lot of runs in. Once she fixes the serve receive and defensive aspects of her game then we will be a lot stronger."

The Plainswomen will have the week to prepare for the Blue Dragon Classic tournament in Hutchinson, Kansas. The team will play against Jefferson College, Iowa Western Community College, and Missouri State University starting at 2 p.m. Friday.

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